


and love too, will ruin us

by finkpishnets



Category: An Education (2009)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-07
Updated: 2012-05-07
Packaged: 2017-11-05 00:26:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 695
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/399870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/finkpishnets/pseuds/finkpishnets
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Sequel to <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/308056">and there are silhouettes behind your eyes</a>.) She hums under her breath as he drives, watching the world pass outside the window, and wonders if time always stands still when she’s by Danny’s side, or if it’s another thing she’s likely to grow out of. She’s not entirely sure she wants to, but then that could be childish fantasy itself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	and love too, will ruin us

**Author's Note:**

> Sequel to [and there are silhouettes behind your eyes](http://archiveofourown.org/works/308056). Comment!fic prompted over at eljay.

Jenny knows it’s him before she sees him, rolls her eyes at the clusters of girls whispering unashamedly under their breath, giggles pitched just high enough for him to hear, and wonders when intellect fell away to basic human instinct -- then she turns the corner to find him lounging against the side of his car, fingers wrapped casually around a half-smoked cigarette and collar pulled up against the cool autumn air, and feels her heart skip inside her chest, cursing her body’s betrayal even as she’s walking forward.

“Want to get out of here?” he says, like it hasn’t been six months since she saw him last, and she still has two classes to go to, has plans to meet her study group at the pub and discuss philosophy over drinks the boys will gladly pay for, but she slides into the passenger seat anyway.

“Where are we going?” she asks, taking a cigarette of her own from the silver box on the dashboard and refusing his light in favour of her own.

“Does it matter?” he says, and she shrugs because of course it doesn’t, not really. 

She hums under her breath as he drives, watching the world pass outside the window, and wonders if time always stands still when she’s by Danny’s side, or if it’s another thing she’s likely to grow out of. She’s not entirely sure she wants to, but then that could be childish fantasy itself.

They find a hotel just as dusk’s beginning to spill across the sky, and when the man at the front desk asks them if they want one room or two, Jenny waits, but Danny doesn’t answer so she does, confidently and without regret.

Danny rolls her body across the sheets and kisses her skin with the pleasant ease of someone who thinks sex should always be taken in good humour, and she laughs and kisses him back because she likes him and because she agrees and because sex with Danny will apparently always catch her a little bit by surprise.

Later that night they go dancing, Jenny in the same dress she wore to university, the sleeves sliding down her shoulders, but Danny just laughs and tugs them further, kissing the exposed skin at the curve of her neck and then spinning her around until she’s laughing as well. People are watching them, and that’s okay too; Danny’s always been at his best under society’s spotlight, and she can’t pretend that it’s not something she craves, something she spent the last moments of her youth seeking out in the arms of a man who didn’t deserve her.

They make a beautiful couple, she knows, and she supposed that could be taken as vanity but in reality it’s just a detached truth, something they’re as aware of as everyone else in the room, but that doesn’t matter, not really.

Danny’s smile pulls at something in her chest that’s too close to her heart for comfort, and she recognises it with a dread that she chooses to kiss away, ignoring the knowing look in his eyes and twisting her fingers in his shirt instead, breathing a sigh of relief when he leans into her and lets it go.

She doesn’t know what will happen this time – if it’ll be just another night like before, or if they’ll both drag it out a little while longer – but she refuses to allow the uncertainty to linger, lets the pleasure flood her veins in its place and doesn’t protest when Danny takes her hand.

Everything about them sings of heartbreak and ruin, of too many _what if’s_ and not enough _tomorrows_ , but she won’t care as long as they remain like this, beautiful and unpredictable and unwilling to shed so much as a single tear in each other’s name. She gave her heart to a man who didn’t deserve her once, caught in a fairytale of scattered truths, but that was then and this is now, and she abandoned naivety along with the streets of her childhood. 

She can’t see their future in dreams behind her eyes, and for that she thinks that maybe it’s worth it after all.


End file.
